


where I end, and you begin

by WeAreTomorrow



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AU, Angst, Book 4: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Cedric Lives, FIx It, Friends to Lovers, Goblet of Fire AU, M/M, PTSD, Slow Build, Slow Burn, hurt comfort
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-03
Updated: 2016-09-03
Packaged: 2018-08-12 17:15:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7942597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeAreTomorrow/pseuds/WeAreTomorrow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cedric knows the moment he feels the portkey tug behind his eyes, that something is wrong. </p><p>--</p><p>Or, the one in which Cedric saves them from You-Know-Who by illegally disapparating and they must deal with the consequences of the Dark Lord's return together.</p><p>Eventual Cedric/Harry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	where I end, and you begin

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING:  
> I will never finish any of my stories. I will disappoint you. I will end on a cliffhanger. I will offer bittersweet salvation and leave you at the twist. Read at your own risk.

Cedric knows the moment he feels the portkey tug behind his eyes, that something is wrong.

It’s a deep feeling in his gut, hot and cold at the same time and he can hear his father’s voice in his ear whisper, “ _trust your instinct, my boy, it’s old magic”,_ and remembers the blindfold and the whoosh of air before the bludger. The body knows it’s in danger before the mind and he ducks left, rolls mid-air and dives before he knows why. It makes his blood rush, makes him feel worth being proud of.

 _You could beat him with your eyes closed_ , father says, healing his broken wrist, hours later. _Who_ , he asks, but he already knows.

They emerge in a muggle graveyard, rough shapes leaning towards them through the clinging darkness, and Cedric knows, deep inside his soul he knows they are not supposed to be here.

“Is this part of the contest, you think?” He asks nervously, trying to get his bearing, trying to think through the heightening white-noise panic in his throat, squinting through the mist when he sees— 

And Harry Potter screams. 

Screams like his nerves are screaming, and there is something in the dark, something _moving_. And Harry Potter, twisting and scrabbling at his forehead as his scar seeming to pulse, to whiten, and they are _not supposed to be here_.

Cedric moves on instinct, without thinking.

He grabs a rough handful of the front of Harry Potter’s robes and twists on his heel. In the long, maybe endless, moment before he completes the movement, he hears in a voice not belonging to any human, _Avada—_

And they disapparate in a wash of green light.

They collapse in the third house down from the cedar bushes of Ottery St. Catchpole, in the dark, and for a moment Cedric thinks he’s dead.

Then he hears a tiny gasp to his right. He reaches out and feels hot, warm liquid spill over his fingers. Harry Potter moans quietly in pain, twitching.

“ _Lumes totalis_!” Cedric commands, and the kitchen is revealed as the ring of lights around the high ceiling splutter to life. He recognizes his mother’s coat thrown over the counter, his father’s morning paper spread out with the pictures moving faintly, as if woken by the light. The familiarity calms him. 

A quiet moan, then a sickening squelching sound.

Sprawled painfully on the floor besides him in a puddle of blood, Harry Potter is drenched red. _Gryffindor red_ , he thinks, somewhat hysterically. It looks like a giant bite has been taken out of his shoulder, a gaping wound the size of a large fist.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Cedric says, his voice strange in his own ears, “This is my fault. I haven’t passed my apparation test yet, I’m not licensed. I just, panicked, and now I’ve gone and splinched you. I’ll take you back—“ 

“ _No!_ ” Harry Potter scrabbles at Cedric’s arm, pulling him down as if to pin him in place, prevent him from moving.

Despite no doubt being dizzy from blood loss and pain, the grip on his arm is like iron. This close to each other, those green eyes are enormous, large as falling stars, he thinks, panicked, and when they slide into sharp focus onto him, Cedric feels the back of his neck flush hot and red. But Harry Potter’s face is pale, almost see-through. It makes the scar stand out like a fresh cattle brand.

It reminds him of that night, the Quidditch match in the whipping rain. The high speed winds made him feel like he was falling, even perfectly still, hovering over the pitch searching for the glint of gold. His father’s whisper in his ear, even above the storm, hisses  _instinct_ and Cedric tries to see with his body like he’s been taught but all he can feel are the bruises the rain leaves on his back. 

And then there’s Harry Potter, wet hair plastered to his face, robes soaked through and clinging to his thin frame. He looks fragile, suspended in the air, and for a moment Cedric imagines that he is made of glass, that he can see right through him. His scar flashes as he turns, a dark shape against pale skin.

And then Harry Potter is falling.

Without thinking, Cedric reaches out and brushes his fingertips against the enflamed lightening bolt shape. Harry flinches and he pulls back, remembering himself. A pit opens up in his stomach.

“Something tried to kill us,” Cedric whispers, warm liquid soaking into his kneels where he leans over the younger boy, practically cradling him with wet palms and slowly his brain begins to work again.

Drawing his wand from inside his robes, he points his unsteady hand at the gaping wound and mutters, “ _Tardus Sarguinem_.”

Harry Potter doesn’t even flinch when the end of his wand flares blue for a moment and the torn open muscles immediately stop gushing blood, but continues to look up at Cedric with an expression he can’t decipher but makes his gut twist. He avoids meeting his eyes under the pretext of muttering a handy cleaning spell and watches the blood melt away into oblivion until he is left, still somewhat sticky, cradling Harry Potter on the kitchen floor of his parent’s house.

Cedric quickly gets to his feet, and after a moment Harry Potter does too.

“We should get you to St. Mungo’s. I just stopped the bleeding, but the sooner they see you, the better.” Cedric says, his voice steadier now, sounding more like him. He turns to riffle through the drawers where his mother usually stashes the Flu Powder. “I’ll get in touch with the school from there, tell them where we are so nobody panics.” 

He grabs the blue container, half-concealed by a bottle of Merlin’s Cure-All and a box of his father’s magical paperclips that will hex anybody trying to steal confidential papers. _Will you be proud of my instincts,_ Cedric wonders, _or should I have stood my ground?_ It will be embarrassing for them both if it turned out the graveyard was part of their final task. But he remembers the half-formed curse, the flash of light.

“I’m sorry.” Harry Potter’s voice is exhausted, older somehow than the boy himself.

Cedric turns, confused, fingers around the Flu Powder, and looks back into those green _green_ eyes. He tries to reconcile this waifish man-child with his messy hair and clenched jaw with everything he thought he knew about The Boy Who Lived, everything he read in the papers and arrives, finally, at the only thing that makes sense. 

“You didn’t put your name in the Goblet.” Cedric says, abruptly. Angrily.

A long pause stretches between them, Harry Potter searching Cedric’s face for some kind of—something. Maybe he finds it. Maybe he doesn’t.

“No,” Harry Potter says, and his shoulders slump like the cut strings of a puppet. “I really didn’t.”

Something very much like understanding, cold and fluttery, nauseating, starts to claw its way up his throat. He sees again, when he closes his eyes, the misshapen figure emerging like a shadow incarnate from the dark. Hears the hiss of death and _knows_.

“You know who that was in the graveyard, don’t you?” Cedric asks, trembling.

And Harry Potter screams.

**Author's Note:**

> Next chapter:
> 
> There’s a well known saying at Hogwarts, and Cedric doesn’t know why he thinks of it now, looking down at Harry’s silhouette in the dark, but he does: "A Gryffindor will always break your heart."


End file.
